Brother of the Dragon

Chapter 7

Though Amero had hoped to question Miteera for more clues about Nianki, the old centaur proved true to his word. He departed with his entire herd before sunrise, long before the Arkuden awoke at Lyopi’s house.

Amero sent children running through Yala-tene with orders to summon the village elders. Before the morning frost had melted off the cliffs, he told the elders about the elves’ attack on the centaurs and exhorted them to finish the village wall as soon as possible. There was some grumbling over his proposal to let the very old and very young tend to fields and stock while the rest labored on the wall, but most of the villagers saw the necessity. None wanted their best defense left unfinished if there was the slightest possibility the Silvanesti might attack.

Amero left the elders debating around the council fire. Only Konza followed him. The elderly Sensarku caught up with Amero before the latter reached the basket of the hoist to Duranix’s cave.

“Arkuden, a word,” said the old man, and Amero paused. “Did the centaurs by chance see any sign of my son?”

Amero looked abashed. “The news of Balif made me forget. Yes. Miteera met Tiphan and the two acolytes in the mountains. The old chief lent them one of his warriors to guard them. Why did Tiphan go, Konza?”

The elder Sensarku looked annoyed. “He doesn’t tell me where his mind is. He thinks I’m too old and foolish.”

Amero placed a hand on Konza’s shoulder. “I’ll ask Duranix to keep an eye out for your son. There can’t be more than one band of three humans and a centaur roaming the mountains together.”

The old man thanked him profusely then departed. Amero climbed into the hoist and set the counterweights in motion. It had been three days since he’d last been to the dragon’s cave. Amero found the cavern cold and dark. With no frail human to complain, Duranix hadn’t bothered to light a fire.

“Duranix!” Amero called. “Duranix, are you awake?”

There was no answer. He got out a flint and some tinder and knelt by the firepit. Hot sparks soon had the fire blazing. As he prepared to call again, the firelight showed him that the dragon was quite close by — just on the other side of the hearth, in fact. The unexpected nearness of the vast creature startled Amero. He let out a yell and fell backward.

“Thunder and lightning!” he said, borrowing one of Duranix’s favorite phrases. “Why are you lurking in the dark?”

The dragon’s burnished scales glowed red in the firelight. “I am listening,” he rumbled.

“To what?”

“I’m not certain. There is a sound in the air that is not a sound, a smell of something that has no smell.”

Amero was instantly concerned. Duranix was not given to fancies or vague feelings. “Is it dangerous?” he asked.

“Anything unknown can be dangerous.”

Amero explained about the Silvanesti threat and the mission he hoped the dragon would perform. “Could it be Balif and the elves you sense?” he asked.

Duranix shook his horned head decisively. “Not elves.” Amero looked at him inquiringly, and the dragon added, “It’s from the other direction, from the west.”

Duranix went to the lower cave opening and sniffed the night air. His dorsal spikes stood up. “There’s a storm coming.” He looked at his human friend and said, “I shall go east as you wish.”

“What more should we do? Are we in danger from the west?”

“There is time yet,” the dragon said. With a spring of his hind legs, Duranix hopped up to the largest of the cave openings. “Watch the setting sun. The storm will come from there.” He shook himself, as if dispelling the unsettling sensations. “I shall return soon.”

“Keep well,” Amero called. “Beware of Balif and his host.”

“Ah, I fear no blades, even in their thousands.” Duranix’s forked tongue flicked out. “I will be like the hawk — watching, keeping out of reach, and striking only if it suits me.”

He entered the plummeting wall of water quietly, almost wafting through. It was completely unlike his usual exuberant exit, and it troubled Amero as much as Duranix’s cryptic farewell.

For seven days Tiphan and his little band tramped eastward, following the mysterious marks on the scrap of Silvanesti parchment. Elu maintained an impassive silence, but the acolytes lent ready ears to Tiphan’s vision of the future. He dreamed of many new villages, each with its own Offertory, spreading across the plains. At the center of this growing realm would be Yala-tene, and the heart of Yala-tene would be the grand new Offertory Tiphan planned to build one day.

“Does the Arkuden agree with your plans?” Mara asked.

“He will see the wisdom of our ideas,” Tiphan replied. “Just as the great Protector brought peace and comfort to one village, so shall we bring it to every part of the land.”

Mara’s head swam with the magnificence of the Tosen’s vision. She tried to imagine many Yala-tenes dotting the plain, each with a whitewashed sanctuary and loyal Sensarku, sending their smoky offerings aloft to please the great dragon. The vastness of the concept left her dizzy — or perhaps the dizziness was the result of their pace. They’d been walking since sunup, and it was well past midday.

She wobbled from side to side in the tall grass. Tiphan, walking ahead of her, continued to talk, spinning his dreams of the future. Before she fell, a strong, rough arm went round her waist, bracing her up. She shook off her dizziness and looked up. With a surprised cry, she pulled free of Elu’s gentle grasp.

“Elu,” Tiphan said sharply. “You must not touch her. Understand? Mara is Sensarku and not to be handled, yes?”

The centaur regarded him with good-natured indifference.

Tiphan came back, took Mara’s hand, and drew her away. She felt a surge of happiness at his touch, but he simply led her a few steps away from the centaur before letting go.

“Keep clear of him,” was all he said, and resumed the trek.

“Yes, Tosen.” She was rather glad he turned away quickly. He missed seeing the color rush to her cheeks.

Penzar came running over the low hill southeast of their path. Elu gripped his club and raised his head, alert for trouble. Penzar arrived, out of breath, and pointed back in the direction he’d come.

“Silvanesti!” he panted.

Alarmed, Tiphan demanded, “How many? How near?”

“There are signs a large band of elves passed here not two days past. Some on foot, some on horseback. They were moving south to north.”

“We must keep clear of them,” Tiphan said. By gestures, he indicated the centaur was to take the lead. Without complaint, Elu cantered away, his club resting on his sun-baked shoulder, his bright green eyes already scanning ahead.

Penzar regarded him thoughtfully. “Brave fellow,” he said. “He’s tangled with Silvanesti before.”

“He’s a savage,” Tiphan corrected. “He doesn’t know any better.”

Despite the increased danger, Tiphan insisted they go on. Long after the sun set, they hurried toward their unknown destination. Late in the evening, under a splendid ceiling of stars, Tiphan finally called a halt.

The three villagers dropped where they stood, worn out by the journey. Mara was starting to resent the way Tiphan was driving them, then she saw him take off his sandals and unwrap his leggings. The blond doeskin strips were stained with blood. Their leader had spared himself least of all.

Elu returned with a brace of rabbits. Mara built a twig fire, and they ate in silence. Tiphan and Penzar fell asleep when they were done, without even spreading their bedrolls. Mara wanted to sleep, but she knew someone had to stand watch.

Elu, his four legs folded beneath him, watched the fire subside to a handful of glowing coals. He ate his fodder, and when he saw Mara nodding sleepily, he fetched a blanket from his panniers. He held it out to her, careful not to touch her.

“Thank you,” she said, taking the soft goathair wrap. She suddenly felt a bit ashamed. Elu really wasn’t so frightening. In his own rough way, he was actually quite gallant. He also seemed wide awake, so she asked, “Will you stand watch?”

Without a word, the centaur walked off into the darkness. For the brief moment before sleep claimed her, Mara saw him silhouetted against the stars, facing east.

It was still night when Mara woke. She couldn’t tell how much time had passed, and she looked around wildly, terrified at having fallen asleep in the open. Her companions were still dozing. A glance showed Elu still on watch in the star-dappled distance. The plain was strangely quiet and devoid of life. She heard none of the usual crickets or night birds.

Rolling over, Mara saw a blue light playing in the sky, not far away. She thought she heard a faint sizzling sound as forked streams of azure fire arced upwards. A hot wind played on her astonished face. Blue lightning from a cloudless sky?

“Wonderful.”

Mara flinched. Tiphan had awakened and was watching the spectacle. “This must be what I came to find,” he said in an awed but oddly serene voice. “I didn’t know exactly where to go, but I believed the way would be revealed. And so it has. Rouse Penzar, and follow me.”

So saying, he rose and walked away, leaving all his gear behind. He strode past Elu without even a glance.

Confused but excited, Mara shook Penzar awake, and they gathered up their baggage. Soon all three were trudging after their leader, now lost in the darkness.

Penzar was shaking his head. “This is not good. This is not good.”

“What are you muttering?” Mara asked.

“It’s not wise for the Tosen to go wandering off. We should stay together.”

Elu suddenly held out an arm, stopping them. He hefted his club and sidled off to the left, into the untrampled grass.

“What is it?” Mara whispered.

Penzar gripped his spear tightly. “I don’t know.”

Elu reappeared, silent as a ghost, and beckoned. Reluctantly they left Tiphan’s trail and followed the centaur. Twenty paces from their original path another track appeared. A single line of horses had passed this way on a converging course.

Elves. They looked anxiously ahead where Tiphan had disappeared. Elu beckoned, and reluctantly they followed the Silvanesti’s track, arms ready. Just then the blue aurora ended without warning, leaving the moonless night profoundly dark. Elu continued to lead the way, placing his heavy hooves with great care so as not to make too much noise.

The grass thinned, replaced by patches of open, sandy soil dotted with loose stones. While Mara looked for Tiphan, Penzar squatted in the dirt and counted the prints of more than a dozen different horses.

Elu stopped abruptly. Mara came up behind him, and she shuddered violently. The air had suddenly gone intensely cold. It was as though they’d crossed some potent, invisible barrier. Mara opened her mouth to exclaim, but Elu put a finger to his lips, signaling silence.

Penzar reached the threshold of cold air and uttered a low grunt of surprise. Mara gripped his arm and pointed ahead.

Against the background of stars they could see many lofty, upright shapes in silhouette. They had reached a field of standing stones.

“Tosen!”

Mara had spotted Tiphan twenty-five paces away. She hurried to him, followed closely by Elu and Penzar.

“We thought you’d been taken by elves!” Penzar exclaimed.

Tiphan was running a hand over one of the granite sentinels. “Elves? I’ve seen no elves.” He frowned and complained, “Odd. I get no sensation of power at all.”

Mara jumped a bit when he seized her wrist, saying, “Here, you try.”

Dutifully, she pressed her fingertips against the cool stone. She shrugged. “It feels like an ordinary rock,” she reported. Penzar tried, with no better results. Elu stood back, refusing to touch the monolith.

“I’m sure this is the place,” Tiphan insisted. “It matches the description in the manuscript, and I’m certain this is where the blue lightning came from.”

“Why is it so cold?” Mara asked, breath pluming from her mouth and nose.

“It’s like the boulders have sucked all the warmth out of the air,” Penzar said.

Muttering, Tiphan wandered into the field. There was no pattern to it. The stones seemed randomly dispersed. Nonetheless, they obviously were not a natural formation.

Tiphan caressed several of the monoliths in turn, feeling nothing. Their initial fear overcome, Penzar and Mara did likewise. Only Elu refused to enter the forest of standing stones. He backed up and stood on the edge of the field, his face a mask of concern.

“Come here!” Tiphan shouted. “Bring tools!”

Mara and Penzar converged on their leader. Penzar had a mallet with a heavy diorite head and a deer-antler pick. At Tiphan’s direction, he struck the corner of one monolith with the mallet. It rang with a surprisingly clear tone, but nothing resulted.

“Again,” said Tiphan. “Harder.”

Penzar swung with both hands, and this time a sharp triangular shard flew off. Mara retrieved the chip and Tiphan put it in a small pigskin bag he wore around his neck. After similarly collecting six good-sized slivers, Tiphan moved on.

Behind the stone they’d chipped was an especially tall block. Tiphan directed his helpers to sample it as well. As Penzar raised the mallet to strike, however, something gleamed on the ground at his feet. He lowered the stone hammer and bent down to examine the bright object.

“Tosen, look!” he said excitedly. “Bronze!”

Tiphan and Mara crowded close. It was a broad metal chisel, plainly of Silvanesti make. The cutting edge was dusted with granite.

“Why would they leave a fine tool like this behind?” Mara wondered.

“They probably mislaid it in the dark,” Tiphan replied.

“Maybe there’s more lying around!” Penzar shuffled his feet in the grass. Bronze was rare and valuable. If the elves had been careless once, they might have been careless twice.

Mara got out her flint. The ground was littered with tufts of dry grass, so she piled up a goodly heap and lit it. A small smoky flame licked up, throwing their shadows high on the tall stones.

“Any more bronze?” asked Penzar, studying the ground by the new light.

Suddenly, Mara gasped, and Tiphan uttered a cry of alarm. Penzar looked up to see what startled them.

“By my ancestors!”

Protruding from the monolith before him were several slender pairs of hands, a knee, and some toes. Higher up, a number of faces appeared, half-embedded in solid rock. Their mouths gaped open as though screaming, but they were filled with cold granite.

Mara stumbled back, covering her face with her hands. Recovering from his initial revulsion, Tiphan stepped closer, peering at the lifeless faces.

“Elves,” he reported. “Probably the same ones who rode here ahead of us.”

“But why are they like this?” Mara asked, her face white.

Tiphan frowned. “They must have committed some offense against the spirits dwelling within.”

“Let’s leave, Tosen,” Penzar pleaded.

“Not yet. I want samples of that rock, too. Mara, make a torch and check the rest of the field. See if more Silvanesti were captured by the spirit-stones.”

Mara hesitated only briefly. She’d been a Sensarku since she was eight years old. The long habit of obedience to her Tosen’s will kept her from fleeing in terror. She used the turned shaft of an elven javelin to make a torch. To the javelin’s bronze head she tied a bundle of dry grass, then held the grass to her dying fire. It blazed up, and she found more lost equipment: sandals, waterskins, knives. Tiphan directed Penzar to use the elven chisel to cut out a stone sample near the embedded bodies. She saw his hands were shaking, but he obeyed the Tosen.

All the nearby boulders held captive bodies. The largest stone held no less than five elves. The ground was covered with lost tools and trinkets — buckles, helmets, knives, scabbards, finger rings, even a sword or two. Looking over the debris, cold sweat broke out on Mara’s chilly brow. Belt buckles and finger rings? Had the Silvanesti taken these off before the stones swallowed them? It seemed unlikely, so why hadn’t these trinkets been consumed as well?

Trinkets. Weapons. Bronze. Copper. Gold. All their metal was at her feet, not in the stones.

She whirled, dropping the torch. “Penzar, stop! Don’t use the chisel!”

Even as she spoke, the ringing of metal on stone reached her ears. Instantly, the deep chill of the field was displaced by a wave of hot wind emanating from the struck monolith. A flash followed, so bright she was blinded even with her eyes clenched shut. Dropping to her knees, she crawled toward where she’d last seen Tiphan and Penzar.

Shrill screams assaulted her ears as she crept forward. The flare in her eyes was fading, and as she regained some of her eyesight she beheld an awful vision: Penzar, arms buried up to the elbows in the gray granite boulder. The stone had softened, resembling gray dough as it flowed thickly toward Penzar’s torso. Mara yelled and grabbed Penzar around the waist.

“Help me, Tosen! Help me!” she screamed over Penzar’s horrible cries.

Tiphan stood several steps away, staring open-mouthed. The massive boulder continued to pull the boy in, and Penzar’s shirt ripped apart as he was dragged from her grip. His frantic pleas for help changed as he saw the gray ooze inching closer to Mara.

“Get away!” he gasped.

Powerful arms hurled Mara aside. She fell back, tears of terror streaming down her face, and saw Elu step past her and grab hold of Penzar’s legs. The centaur’s hard muscles strained, but the boy was already lost. Thick tentacles of liquid stone entwined around his neck, pulling his head in, filling his ears, nose, and mouth. His cries ended in a ghastly thick gurgle. With a final sound like rushing wind, the stone block enclosed him completely.

Wavering tendrils reached out, blindly seeking more prey. Elu darted quickly out of reach. Mara continued to shout Penzar’s name.

“It’s too late!” Tiphan shouted. “He’s gone!”

As the words were said, Penzar’s hands and the left side of his face appeared on the monolith, as though he was bobbing to the surface of a pool of granite. His eye sockets and open mouth were gray with solidified stone.

“It was the metal,” Mara sobbed. “It’s all around us! Penzar and the elves were swallowed by the stones because they touched them with metal!” She turned her face into Tiphan’s shoulder, weeping helplessly.

“The stone mallet did not arouse them,” Tiphan said slowly, recognizing the truth of her words. “So the lightning we saw must have occurred when the boulders came alive and engulfed the elves.” He nodded his head slowly, wonderingly. “Such amazing power!”

Mara raised her tear-stained face and regarded him with outrage. He neither comforted her nor lamented the loss of Penzar, who’d been a loyal acolyte for years. Worse, Tiphan stared at the dreadful stones with a look of near ecstasy.

Pushing herself away, Mara took Elu’s proffered hand, and the centaur led her slowly away.

Tiphan grabbed the diorite hammer and began to peck at the hulking monolith, just an arm’s length from where Penzar’s lifeless hand protruded, fingers curled in supplication.

“Come back!” he called over his shoulder absently. “I want samples from all these stones.”

Mara neither answered nor returned, and Tiphan soon forgot her as he concentrated on reaping his harvest.